Joseph Biggar

Joseph Biggar (1828-19 February 1890) was the Irish Parliamentary Party MP for Cavan from 1874 to 1885 and for West Cavan from 1885 to 1890 (preceding Edmund Vesey Knox).

Biography
Joseph Biggar was born in Belfast, County Down, Ireland in 1828 to a Presbyterian family of Ulster Scots. He headed a merchant firm from 1861 to 1880, and he converted to Catholicism in 1875 in sympathy with Irish nationalism. He was elected to the Belfast Council in 1871, and he went on to serve as the Home Rule League and Irish Parliamentary Party MP for Cavan (West Cavan from 1885) from 1874 until his death in 1890. He supported filibustering to force the British Liberal Party and Conservative Party to listen to the Irish nationalists' demands; he also became a member of the Supreme Council of the IRB, although he opposed physical force Irish republicanism. He died in 1890.